My Spiel On Characters And What Makes Them Likeable
Okay, so I was requested by 3 people to make a rant/spiel/speech thing on characters and what makes them likeable, hateable, etc. I've said before that characters make a huge impact on the story and are required to make a story sucessful. Characters are the pillars for making something good. So here, I'll talk about characters within Anime/Manga/Video Games mainly. Let's start on GOOD characters. I tend to like ones with more than just one personality, with more depth. And good abilities. There are many traits that I like in characters. Funny, smart, serious, silly, dark, mature, trolling, teasing, light, nice, strong, brave, tough, innocent, cute, mysterious, etc. I like many traits in characters, but there are times that it makes them bad characters. I also am a sucker for people with darker pasts and more mysterious people. Also, development is what I look at the most. I tend to like characters who are kind of cold or lone wolf characters, but become better over time. Though I look a lot in personality, I also look at how useful the characters are. Though I'm usually talking about anime/manga/video games with fighting, you see my point. In those type of media, I always look at their abilities and what they do. Honestly, I take ability over personality, in those three types of media at least. Alright, I have a decent amount of favorite characters, those I hate, those I dislike, and those that are just meh. There are some people that I like immediately, and some that take me a while to like. But I have absolute favorites that I often like to talk about. Okay, first, I'll talk about Erza Scarlet from Fairy Tail and why I prefer her over the other female lead, Lucy Heartfilia. I love Erza, and Lucy is more "Meh" to me. (Keep in mind that I'm not too far in Fairy Tail.) Okay, I like Erza because she's tough, the strongest mage in Fairy Tail, and can take down pretty much anything. She's serious, strict, and scary. Lucy is more optimistic, intelligent, and feminine. But she's pretty weak if you ask me. Sure, she can summon Celestial Spirits, but without them, she's pretty useless. And in the beginning of Fairy Tail, she doesn't do anything, she let's Gray, Natsu, and Erza do all the fighting. Though I like Lucy's personality better, I prefer Erza because she DOES something. And Erza does improve in personality over time, she becomes a better person through her development. Personally, I think Erza is a perfect example of a good character. I guess I'm a sucker for female characters that can fight and take down people. But it's more than that. It really depends on what type of media it is. I don't like female characters that think they can take down anyone and if they're mean to other people and always beat them up and treat them like crap. Though this is different depending on the type of story. If it's a fighting story, I'll like them better. But if it's a regular story without supernaturalness and fighting, I wouldn't really like them. Also, I tend to look at the importance of the character in the story. If they are a main character, supporting, or minor. Let's see, I'll bring Aurora as an example. If she was a Main Character, I wouldn't like her very much. I'm tougher on main characters. And I tend to dislike more submissive characters, but I liked Aurora. But if she was a Main Character, she wouldn't work out well. A Main character makes an impact on the story. Without the main character, the story is gone. The story will change. If Aurora was a main character, she wouldn't have much of an impact of the story. She's just another Agent like the others. There's nothing really there that would distinguish her from the others. I tend to look at things like this. It's hard to compare different characters if they have different roles in the story. If you compare a main character to a minor one, you can't really do it for everything. A main character has many different expectations, while minor characters have little ones. Also, main characters have to develop sometime, either ability wise, or personality wise. Okay, let's look at another character I like... Like Lightning from Final Fantasy XIII. She's kind of a jerk in the beginning, cold, and kind of cruel. But she's still a good person. I liked her, because she could fight, she had the mindset of a soldier, and could take on anyone. But overtime, she would start to be more compassionate. That's a good character. I've been talking about female characters, but I'll go on with males. With males, my expectations are a bit different. With females, I tend to like stronger females, compassionate ones, shy people, etc. I tend to like any females as long as they try and aren't cry babies or wimps. With males, it's a bit different. I like colder dudes, and I also like the cooler males. The cool, mature ones. Though I sometimes like the perky idiots, or dense people, and sometimes awkward guys. It really depends on the story and what they do, but I always preferred the cool dude. I loved Yuri Lowell from Tales of Vesperia. There's a reason why he tops number 1 for EVERY SINGLE TALES POPULARITY POLL SINCE THE GAME CAME OUT. He's different from other male leads, he's mature, kind of a troll, and the second oldest in the group. He's just plain awesome, and he's pretty funny. And he's cool. I don't know, I tend to like the smarter guys and ones who know what they're doing. And I'm also a sucker for darker guys, and those who are just awesome at fighting. Yuri was kind of a special case. He didn't really change in personality, and it's okay, considering how the story didn't really revolve around him. Though I typically don't like the type of character, I liked Naruto Uzamaki... Or in this case Uzamaki Naruto. He was kind of an idiot, dense, reckless, childish, and brash. But he's a good kid, he has really good development in the story and becomes more mature and like a hero. He goes from the worst ninja, to one of the best. And I really felt bad for him, his past was really sad and depressing. But he was compassionate and always stuck to his dream about being Hokage one day. Here's where the ranting part starts. There are a lot of traits that I HATE. Wimpiness, submissiveness, idiocy, meanness, ditziness (most of the time), arrogance, snots, boring characters, PERFECT CHARACTERS, DAMSEL IN DISTRESSES, boy-crazy idiots, overly girly characters, selfishness, cry babies, PEOPLE WHO ARE TOO NICE FOR THEIR OWN GOOD, USELESS CHARACTERS... The list goes on, but you get my drift. I see these traits everywhere, especially in female characters, which is probably a reason why I hate a lot of them. Females that I hate: NEARLY ALL DISNEY PRINCESSES (With the exception of Rapunzel, Elsa, Mulan, and Merida.) Princess Peach, Sakura Haruno, Aerith Gainsbourough, SOMETIMES Princess Zelda (She was cool in Ocarina of Time and Twilight Princess), Rosa, Mary Jane Watson, Amy Rose, Rachel Dare, BELLA SWAN, almost all the female love interests in video games, almost all the female lead characters that can use magic and are wimps, I can go on and on. All of these characters were either A. Useless, B. Annoying, C. Wimps, D. Idiots, E. Overly Feminine, F. Irritating love interests, or G. All of the above. There are some on my list with "good personalities" like kindness, naivety, charmingness, innocence, etc. WELL GUESS WHAT, THEY STILL SUCK. I hate characters that are too kind for their own good, the ones that act like "Oh, everything's going to be alright! I'll save everyone!" AND YET THEY DO NOTHING AND GET THEIR SORRY BUMS KICKED WHILE THE GUY DOES ALL THE SAVING. Or the ones that are unrealistically kind and optimistic, they are really a bunch of idiots. And half the time, they are useless. And I hate overly girly characters, unless they have something that they can prove to be useful with. All they do is talk about guys, care about what they look like, etc. I also hate wimps and cry babies. I know that not everyone can be strong, but THEY COULD AT LEAST TRY INSTEAD OF JUST SITTING THERE AND CRYING THEIR BUTTS OFF. And everyone hates arrogance and snots... Also, the overly nice characters are also pretty dull and boring. They don't really have anything else going on for them and this is seen in a lot of love interests, where their only impact and role in the story is serving as some love interest. Half the time, they are robots with nothing to them. I also hate perfect characters who are GOOD AT EVERYTHING or do something that makes them unrealistic. I bet there's always that one person out there who's annoyingly perfect and are literally good at everything with no flaws that make them unhuman. Yeah, I dislike perfect characters because they are completely unhuman. I hate spineless weaklings that can't do anything to defend themselves. Yes, I get that not everyone can fight or whatever, but they could at least try. And especially in fighting genres, they are completely useless. Do you really want someone utterly worthless on your team that will get their butts kicked every single time they enter a fight?! I guess I mainly hate these type of characters, well those females in the list because most of them are main characters. There's all this potential for a main character, but guess what? A LOT OF THEM DO NOT CHANGE AT ALL. I do not have any respect for these kind of characters and to them, they get the middle finger. Okay, let's look at male characters. Similar goes for them, but I don't hate as many males as females. I don't really have a list of males I dislike, but there are a lot of males that I'm more like "Meh". I don't like: Wimps, jerks, idiots, losers, arrogance, cry babies, snots, boring characters and selfish people, whiny people... And perfect guys. Yep, I'm big on wimps. I can't stand people who can't stick up for themselves or at least try to. Wimps just rely too much on other people and cannot do anything on their own, thus making them absolutely useless and worthless. A lot of times, the wimps are a bunch of whiny guys that complain too much. Oh, and I also dislike characters that are WAY too idealistic, like "Oh my gosh, I have to save everyone. I WILL save the world!" blah, blah, blah. Okay, I get that you're a good guy, but do you REALLY have to go "I'll save everyone!" on everyone?! It gets really annoying, and the characters come off as arrogant and diluted as well. Anyway, back to useless characters. I hate the ones that are supposedly important or are main characters, but just sit there the whole time or pretty much have no impact on the story. I'm mainly talking about Anime and Manga here. A perfect example would be Sakura Haruno. Sure, she gets stronger and slightly more useful in Shippuden, but she's still kind of useless. Sakura literally STANDS there in the first 180 episodes of Naruto, holding a freaking Kunai, doing NOTHING while Naruto, Sasuke, and Kakashi are doing all the work. She's supposedly a "top student" and her statuses are higher than Naruto's... THEN WHY DOES SHE DO NOTHING?! If she's more skilled, shouldn't she be DOING SOMETHING?! Literally, all she does in Naruto is cry or stand there and yell "SASUKE-KUN!" She yells "Sasuke-kun!" IN EVERY FREAKING EPISODE. Her backstory is absolutely pathetic. I get how she was bullied as a kid, but that was NOTHING compared to Sasuke and Naruto's backgrounds. Their parents died, Sasuke's entire clan was murdered, everyone hated Naruto. Okay, so Sakura gets more useful in Shippuden, but only for a few episodes/chapters. She only gets like ONE important fight in the series, but she relied on this other person for the entire fight. She gets super strength and medical ninjutsu, but she doesn't really do much with it. Yeah, she's supposedly on par with Naruto and they have the same stats in Shippuden, but WHY DOESN'T SHE USE THESE ABILITIES. When she actually does some type of fight, all she does is get her butt kicked and she still needs to get saved by Naruto or Kakashi. WHY ARE YOU HERE IF ALL YOU DO IS CREATE TROUBLE FOR EVERYONE?! And she was a complete jerk to Naruto in the beginning, but even though she developed and got nicer she was still a jerk to him. HE IS IN LOVE WITH YOU, BUT ALL YOU DO IS PUNCH HIM ALL THE TIME AND TREAT HIM LIKE CRAP. HE GIVES UP EVERYTHING FOR YOU AND ALL YOU DO IS YELL "SASUKE-KUN!". You don't have to feel the same way, but QUIT LEADING POOR NARUTO ON. Also, she HAS NO IMPACT ON THE STORY. Sakura is just there! SHE'S JUST THERE. Her only role in the story is being part of the team and being a sorta love interest. Also, she doesn't have any cool jutsus, has almost no screen time compared to Sasuke and Naruto, or even has any cool battles. They should seriously just kill her off or something. If you take her out of the story, it doesn't really change anything. Sakura is currently one of the most hated characters in Naruto and of anime history. She sucks. I'll admit that I like the development she has ability-wise, but what's annoying is that SHE DOESN'T USE THEM. After a few arcs in Shippuden, she's almost completely forgotten. If she's a main character, she should do something. She gets SO much negative-development here. Also hated Orihime Inoue from Bleach. She's supposedly pretty, optimistic, highly imaginative, one of the top students in her class, likes doodling, big chested, naive, and innocent. Oh, and she's bad at cooking. Do you know what this screams? MARY SUE! Though Mary Sues are supposed to be perfect characters that are for some reason popular, they just randomly throw in like one flaw like clumsiness or bad at cooking to make them more likeable... I hate them, they should just die. Orihime is just useless. I get that she's a normal girl, but she has these "powers" to heal things... I hate the anime/manga girls who literally are good at many things, but when it's time to take action, they do nothing. All she does is yell "KUROSAKI-KUN" or some other person's name... What an idiot. She's a completely weak girl in distress and always relies on her friends to help her.